Study: Videogames Make You Pregnant

April 11th, 2006, 12:45 Posted By: wraggster

Source CVG

It's a fact! Play too many violent videogames and colonel sausage will be shooting sticky white ammunition without the protection of his magic tin hat all over town. That's according to a study published in US journal The Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, which concluded that gaming nasties foster "permissive attitudes toward violence, alcohol use, marijuana use, and sexual activity without condom use".
Which sounds like a pretty run-on-the-mill Friday night to us. However, the study, conducted by researchers in San Francisco and Pittsburgh, and entitled "Effects of Media Violence on Health-Related Outcomes Among Young Men", used 100 males aged between 18 and 21, randomly assigning them to play either Grand Theft Auto III or The Simpsons: Hit and Run (which is, frankly, just mean).

It seems that those participants forced to bathe in the unholy perversions of GTA III "exhibited greater increases in diastolic blood pressure from a baseline rest period to game play, greater negative affect, more permissive attitudes toward using alcohol and marijuana, and more uncooperative behavior in comparison with men randomly assigned to play The Simpsons". Although the scientific methodology is unclear, we'd like to imagine it involved surreptitiously sidling up to participants mid-game and whispering "I could really do with a spliff and a beer right now - how about you?".
Anyway, the report reached the conclusion that "although youth growing up in violent homes and communities may become more physiologically aroused by media violence exposure, all youth appear to be at risk for potentially negative outcomes."

Interestingly, the wholly conclusive findings of this report have made us so angry at game developers, we're off to go punch someone in the face. Next up: "Effects of Academic Studies concerning Media Violence on Health-Related Outcomes Among Young Men".

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